A Twist of Fate
by PointlessKnife
Summary: After Trisha Elric passed away, it seemed like the brothers were going to have to fend for themselves... Until their long lost relatives were found! Meanwhile, it becomes apparent very quickly that Father and the homunculi have no clue what they're doing when it comes to children. A series of one-shots for an AU where the Elric Brothers were raised by the homunculi.
1. Chapter 1

It all started because of a 'happy accident'.

When Trisha Elric tragically passed away, the ususal search for any living relatives that could take them in occured... And somehow, by what had to be sheer luck, Hohenheim's 'brother' was said to be living in Central.

Well, more specifically, underneath Central, but that was in the fine print.

To this day, it is still not quite known exactly how they managed to find the lair of the homunculi and their Father.

It is even less known how it was figured out that they were linked to the Elric brothers.

And only speculations can be made on exactly why anyone thought that letting the two boys be adopted by the homunculi and their Father was a good idea.

* * *

Father had mail. That in itself was odd. So odd, in fact, that he had gathered all of his children around so they could all stare at the envelope in shock.

"How did they even..." Lust trailed off as Father opened the letter, and frowned as he read it.

"Do any of you know the names Edward or Alphonse Elric?" He asked after reading the first sentence.

There was a long pause as his children attempted to remember the names of the people they had killed recently.

"Or Trisha Elric?"

There was an even longer pause.

"Ah, so they're _his_ children."

"Because that clears _so_ much up." Greed snapped sarcastically. "This whole thing makes no sense. Who the fu-"

"Watch your language Greed," Father said suddenly, tone cold. At that, all the homunculi frowned. Father never cared what they did... Unless Gluttony had eaten all the chimeras that guarded thier lair _again_. Then he cared.

"Edward and Alphonse Elric are two young boys that recently lost their mother. It appears that we are their only relatives since their father left a while ago."

At this, Envy could only splutter. "W-what? We're related to these two random kids?"

"How?" Lust demanded.

Pride merely narrowed his eyes.

"Through their father, you know, Van Hohenheim. And we're taking them in because they have nowhere else to go."

"Oh."

There was a long pause.

"Do we have to?"

Father suddenly beamed. It was scary. "It would annoy Hohenhiem. So yes."

* * *

"Brother, have we ever even _heard_ of these people?" Al asked timidly.

"No. No we haven't. Either the bastard just never told us, or... Long lost relatives?" Ed shrugged.

"I still can't believe that we're going to Central... It's so far away." Al whimpered. Ed hugged his younger brother as Al began to cry.

"I know Al... At least we'll still have each other."

"Y-yeah... Do you think they're nice?"

"I hope so!"

* * *

"Someone needs to go and collect them." Father informed his children. "They live in Reesembool."

"Well, I'm sure as fu-"

"Greed!"

"Sorry," the homunculus reluctantly corrected himself. "I'm not doing it."

"Who?" Gluttony asked cluelessly. "Can I eat them?"

"No... What about Sloth?"

His only response was a snore.

Pride sighed. "Why even ask him? It can't be me. I can't really travel with my vessel. Too many questions."

Wrath shrugged. "I need to get back to the military soon anyway."

Father was rapidly running out of options.

"Envy?"

Envy whistled innocently. Father sighed.

"Lust... Just please..."

Lust sighed. "Fine."

* * *

Ed and Al stared up at Lust.

Lust stared down at them in shock. They did look a lot like Father. They also looked like very, very sad children.

Well they _had_ just lost their mother.

Contrary to popular belief, the homunculi weren't emotionless. They weren't born cruel, even if they embodided sins. Because after years and years of trying, they'd learned to be human, even if just a little.

And...

 _"At least act normal around them."_

Granted that Father's statement had been directed at the likes of Envy, Greed and Pride, but she had no doubt that he would be annoyed if she accidently traumatised the children they would be raising.

So Lust smiled as she looked at the boys. "Hello," She said as kindly as she could. "I'm..." Well, they were coming back to the HQ, so she may as well be honest. "I'm Lust. I'm your cousin." That was what was on the papers, apparently.

"I'm Edward." The older one introduced himself with a nervous smile.

"And I'm Alphonse." The younger boy smiled even though he was shaking.

"You two don't need to be so nervous." Lust laughed, hoping that she didn't terrify the children any more than she already had. Father would _kill_ her. "We're family!" Crap, she really didn't know how to deal with children. At all...

Still, it was better her than Envy, or Greed. She almost shuddered at the thought of either of those two being near impressionable children.

Especially the two innocent, golden eyed children staring at her with something like hope in their eyes.

* * *

They took the train to Central because it was the fastest way there. The boys didn't have much luggage, only two suitcases between them. They were, however, surprisingly heavy.

At her questioning glance they boys laughed sheepishly.

"They're alchemy books."

What? The boys knew alchemy? Weren't they a bit young for that?

Well, if nothing else, this was sure to be interesting.

* * *

By the time they arrived in Central, it was late at night. The boys could barely walk straight, let alone carry their bags.

Lust sighed, and took the bags from them. "We're nearly there. Don't worry."

Ed yawned. "Good."

"Brother!" Al yelped, though it looked like he agreed with Edward.

Maybe it was a good thing they were tired, since they were then too sleepy to so much as raise an eyebrow as she lead them pass the chimeras into their HQ.

Thankfully, their rooms were normal, and the two collapsed onto the beds. She put the cases down and shrugged.

Well, they were here in one piece and not traumatised. Success then.

* * *

"Well Lust, did you collect the boys?" Father asked with some mild interest as he turned a page in the book he was reading.

"Yes." She made a show of inspecting her nails. "They're sleeping."

"What are they like?" Greed asked, sounding bored.

"Quiet... Probably because they're greiving. Oh, and they know alchemy."

The book snapped shut. "Oh? That's interesting. They really are Hohenheim's kids... Hmm... I take it that they're still learning, naturally. They will need teaching in all aspects, actually."

The seven homunculi suddenly all had a very bad feeling.

"Guess what? You all have a new job!"

"What the f-"

"Greed!"

Once again, Envy whined. "Do we _have_ to?"

"Yes." Father smirked. "Those boys are family. Treat them like you would each other... Well, if you couldn't regenerate... Am I clear?"

Whether they sounded reluctant or just plain bored, all the homunculi agreed to at least try. They'd done worse on their Father's orders.

And well, these kids were family. If there was one thing any of the homunculi valued, it was blood and family.

Hohenheim was going to be _so_ pissed!

* * *

The next morning, Ed and Al decided to explore, as they hadn't been given a tour, no one had come to check on them and they were _bored_.

"Do you think we're meant to be doing this?" Al asked curiously.

"Probably not." Ed shrugged. "But it was either that, or stay in the room and re-read a book."

"Good point."

The corridors were weird- and cold. There were pipes running along the sides... Was that normal? Was it something that people in Central did? (Well, Reesembool was pretty rural...)

Ed highly doubted that.

In fact, he had a sneaking suspicion that...

They rounded a corner, to gain full view of a large room where the floor was crossed with pipes, all leading up one chair.

On said chair- or was it a throne- a man that looked exactly like Hohe- that bastard (and it was Pinako that taught him that word, so she couldn't very well tell him off for using it) sat reading a book, looking bored and ingoring the general chaos around him.

Said chaos consisted of a stange man with what looked like a feather boa on his jacket pulling ... a palm tree's hair while said tree screamed like a little girl and attempted to punch the one with the sunglasses.

Lust would have looked dignified, if not for the chubby person whining and tugging her sleeve like a child.

There was a sound like thunder- the large man snoring.

And a child was face palming... With what looked like shadowy faces consisting of razor sharp teeth and glaring red eyes doing the same with their tiny claw-like hands.

Ed slowly turned to his brother, and spoke with a voice filled half with impressed awe and half complete and utter horror.

"We are related to some _weird_ people."


	2. Chapter 2

**A/N: Oh yeah, due to this not being particularly plot-heavy, I forgot to mention this before... This is an AU where Greed didn't leave or hasn't left yet. Sorry for not mentioning this before! I completely forgot...**

 **That being said, as usual, I don't own FMA and I hope you enjoy the chapter! :)**

* * *

"You all have _weird_ names."

After their initial meeting, Father had thought it would be best to have everyone sit down and introduce themselves...

It hadn't gone well.

"Yeah, well blame him." Greed pointed angrily at Father. "And what's wrong with these names?"

"Everything." The elder brother said with the flatness and viciousness only a child could muster. In Ed's defence, the room was creepy and the names were weird, and suddenly going from a life where everything was familar in the countryside to a life where your family members were named after the seven deadly sins... It would be enough to scare anyone.

"I happen to like my name." Pride sniffed.

"You would." Envy sneered. Then he turned to the brothers. "And who are you to talk?" He snarled, glaring at them.

Only he'd forgotten that they were, after all children.

Needless to say, after one vemomous look, the two burst into loud, noisy tears. Envy's face when he was made could make military officers wet themselves. For two children...

"Shit"

"Greed!"

"What? I didn't make them cry, you can't blame me!"

"Oh, right... Envy!"

"..." The homunculus took one look at his unimpressed father and sighed. "Sorry."

Oddly enough, Envy's apology didn't stop the two from crying.

In the end, it was Lust that stopped the boys from crying. It took several hugs, some reassuring words and many nasty glares aimed at Envy.

Then she lead the now-quiet boys to another room to get them something to eat.

Meanwhile, the homunculi made a horrifying discovery: they didn't have a clue when it came to children, and they were going to have to learn. Quickly.

* * *

"Quick, someone go and grab books on small children and parenting. We need the help!"

Oh well, Hohenheim was still going to be annoyed.

* * *

Life soon settled into an uneasy routine. The brothers would spend the morning reading, and books that were surprisingly educational would be deposited outside their door.

At least they were technically getting an education.

Then they'd have an entire afternoon of spending time with one of their relatives. Fun.

One such afternoon had them spending time with Greed.

"Alright, you little shi-"

A shout echoed down the halls. "Greed!"

Greed sighed. Oh yeah, the book on young children mentioned patience and not swearing. Apparently.

He hadn't actually read that in there, but according to literally all of the other homunculi, it was pretty obvious and didn't need to be written down.

 _"It's called reading between the lines."_

"Have you had a tour yet?" He asked, because he was completely stuck here.

Maybe he _should_ have done more than skim read the damn thing.

"No... Should we have had a tour by now?" Al asked, while Ed stared at Greed's tattoo.

Greed shrugged. "Probably. F- heck if I know."

And so he lead the children down a maze of corridors.

"Why are there so many corridors. There aren't even that many rooms. So having this many corridors is just stupid." Ed pointed out.

"I don't know. But I have to patrol them all. And it takes forever." Greed groaned.

"Oh, so that's why." Ed muttered, while Al blinked.

"Why do you have to patrol them? It isn't all that likely that there'll be intruders." He asked. Then thought about it. "I mean we've hardly seen anyone since we arrived here."

Greed was fairly sure that probably wasn't good for a child's development, or some crap like that. But he'd only skim-read the book, so he wouldn't know.

"I guess I make sure the scientists do their job." Actually, he could do _that without_ patrolling the corridors. Why did he even have to do that? Maybe the kids were right.

(Meanwhile, Father groaned as he felt a headache coming on. What had one of his children done _this_ time?)

"Oh? What do the scientists do?" The boys chorused. It took Greed a second to remember that they were achemy nerds.

"Well recently they made these dolls- actually, it'll be easier to show you..."

* * *

"Hello Greed." Father barely glanced up as the homunculus strolled into the main room. Then he blinked.

"Greed..." He started dangerously.

"What?" The sin asked innocently.

"Weren't the brothers meant to be with you." He raised an eyebrow.

Greed smiled. "Oh, well they were having so much fun with the prototype dolls that the scientists made that I figured that I could leave them there for a while."

Father blinked. That didn't sound too bad... But there was one thing that worried him.

No, it wasn't the fact that two small children had been left in a room full of volatile experiments. Nor the fact that these experiments were disturbing, humanoid dolls strung up by their ankles.

No... It was...

"Did they have anything they could potentially draw with?"

Greed frowned. "Actaully..." There _had_ been a pack of pens at the desk in the corner.

"They're alchemists Greed. Alchemists."

And children. Curious children capable of performing alchemy in a room full of objects linked to human transmutation.

"... Shit."

* * *

"I... I know they're only children, but somehow, I didn't see this coming." Greed could only stare in a mixture of awe and horror at the sight that lay before him.

The room looked nothing like how he had left it...

The dolls... The poor, poor dolls. The scientists were going to be furious.

Each lifeless doll now sported a bushy ink moustache. Or cat whiskers. Or glasses.

Greed collapsed into hysterical laughter right in front of the Elric brothers, who were attempting to look sorry, or even guilty, and were failing miserably.

"I like you kids." Greed spluttered. "Do this more often."

"So we won't get in trouble?" Ed asked hopefully.

Father's flat look told them otherwise.

* * *

Unlike the Elric brothers, Greed couldn't avoid punishment using the adorable, pleading stare. So he ended up having to help Wrath with his paperwork, while the brothers got to read a book on some ancient form of alchemy.

It look so complicated that Greed thought it was a punishment. Then he remembered that the boys liked alchemy...

Wrath had no help with his paperwork whatsoever. But he did gain a quick and easy method of shredding paper.

* * *

"Hi." Envy beamed down at the brothers in an attempt to be friendly. Anyone that didn't know the homunculus would think that he felt bad about scaring the boys to tears and was attempting to make up for it by being nice.

And anyone that _did_ know the homunculus would know that there was always some weird, convoluted reason for everything he did.

 _"Envy... Please, just spare me a headache- I mean, look, prove to me that you can do a better job of looking after your younger relatives than Greed can."_

A chance to prove he was better than Greed?

Envy would be the best cousin ever if it meant annoying Greed! And he had a plan.

See, he'd also skim-read the book on young children, but unlike Greed, he'd remembered some important details.

Namely: small children like small, fluffy animals.

Unfortunately, Envy wasn't allowed to traumatise them if he wanted to prove he was better than Greed, so he couldn't just transform into a dog or something, but he could improvise.

"Have you guys seen the chimeras yet?"

Again, this should have raised some red flags.

"No... Can we see the chimeras?" Al asked, while Ed began to look slightly worried.

Envy beamed. "Of course!"

Thirty minutes later, Envy began to think that he may have made a mistake... Or that his plan had worked a little too well.

No, he wasn't at all concerned that he had taken two small children to a pack of guard animals created to kill intruders. They knew not to attack him, or anyone with him. So what if they scared the children, then that was their fault.

Actually, that wasn't the problem at all.

Ed glared at Envy. "What have you done?" The poor boy looked like he was about to cry.

Envy awkwardly patted the boy on the head. "For what it's worth, I'm sorry."

"Aww, look, he's so cute!"

Al loved the chimeras. And the chimeras loved Al.

This had resulted in the normally bloodthirsty creatures flocking around Al as the child laughed and hugged them.

Meanwhile, Ed and Envy were bored out of their minds as they sat on one of the pipes.

"Oh, do they have names?" Al asked, and Envy responded without thinking.

"No."

Then he realised esactly what he had said, and what he had just brought about.

"Oops?"

Ed didn't look like he was about to forgive him anytime soon.

"Oh, this one can be called Fluffy!"

"I... I didn't think?" Envy offered sheepishly.

"And this one- oh he's part kitty!"

"No." Ed looked at the floor. "No you didn't."

"And this one can be Spotty."

"He's gonna name them all, isn't he?"

"Yep."

"Oh crap, we'll be here for hours."

"You said it."

And that was how Ed and Envy bonded through trying to climb the pipes to escape overly affectionate chimeras that decided that Envy and Ed needed some love too.


	3. Chapter 3

**A/N: Another quick thing... Don't expect the timelines to make sense here... Like Ishbal and dates... Sorry!**

 **Oh, and imagine that Wrath wasn't at the whole 'introducing thing' last chapter... Oopsies...**

Wrath blinked and stared down at the two children. "Hello?" He offered.

The two merely continued to stare.

Wrath sighed. This was awkward. "I think they're broken." He complained to Father.

(Meanwhile, Envy smirked. _He_ hadn't broken the children. He was _so_ much better than Greed!)

"We're related to the Furher?" Both the children screamed.

"Surprise!" Father tried to sound guilty, he really did.

The two dirty looks he received told him exactly what the Elric brothers thought of him in that moment.

Wrath shrugged. "I can take them to my office, if you insist on me looking after them." He told Father.

Father mentally sighed. That was the best he was going to get.

(Envy suddenly had the feeling that he was better than Wrath, too)

* * *

"Being Furher is actually pretty boring." Wrath explained to the brothers as they stood in the elevator. "There's a lot of paperwork."

Surprisingly enough, neither of the brothers questioned the fact that there was an elevator leading from their home to the military HQ in Central.

"What do you do for entertainment?" Al asked curiously.

"I watch my subordinates... There's a lot of drama. And if there isn't any drama, I can always do surprise inspections." Wrath shrugged. "There's always something going on."

"Oh... So what kind of paperwork do you do?" This time, it was Ed that asked. And Wrath suddenly had the impression that the kids had to be _really_ bored to be asking about paperwork of all things.

Hah, wait until he forces them to do some of his work.

Now _that_ was going to be boring.

* * *

"You're both abnormally intelligent, right?" Wrath clarified as he dragged up two chairs at a spare desk in his office.

"Apparently so." Ed shrugged.

Well, they were abnormally smartass so that had to count for something.

"Well, this is meant to be a bonding exercise, to help you settle in and all that." He began, shuffling over to his desk and staring at the mountain of papers. Then he picked up the top half and dumped it in front of the boys.

"And they say that sharing is caring, so enjoy!"

"What?" The two spluttered.

"I'm the Fuhrer. I have a lot of work. You get the privilege of helping me." He explained with a cheerful grin. "I would be _very_ annoyed if any of those _very important_ documents were to be completed poorly."

The two boys each glared at him, then grabbed a pen and started working on the papers furiously.

* * *

By some miracle, it was an entire twenty minutes before the first paper airplane landed on Wrath's desk. He checked which form it was, before shrugging and throwing it right back where it came from.

Then two more followed. He frowned and checked them. They were different forms this time. They weren't actually important forms, so he merely shrugged and threw them back.

Then the next airplane sent to him had a transmutation circle on its side. He peered at it curiously, wondering what it did.

And he grew to hate the brothers as the circle lit up in a flash of brilliant blue light...

Only for a miniature explosion of air to sweep all of the papers off his desk.

He groaned and remembered that father told him that he couldn't kill the brats as he set out picking up all of the papers.

They had better be actually doing the stuff he gave them.

* * *

Wrath glanced down at the first sheet after the boys had been sent back to Father for their alchemy lesson. Everything seemed to be in order. He skim-read the rest of the pile, just to check that everything was completed properly.

Yep, everything looked _fine_.

He should let the boys do his paperwork more often.

* * *

Three young(ish) alchemists sat impatiently under the stares of different commanding officers as they anxiously awaited to hear whether or not they had successfully become State Alchemists.

"I'll read it out now..."

* * *

"By the power vested in me as Fuhrer, I King Bradley, hereby bestow upon Issac McDougal the title of... Frosty."

* * *

"By the power vested in me as Fuhrer, I King Bradley, hereby bestow upon Solf J Kimblee the title of... (King Explosion Murder) Blasty **(*)**."

* * *

"By the power vested in me as Fuhrer, I King Bradley, hereby bestow upon Roy Mustang the title of... Snappy."

* * *

"WHAT THE F**K?!"

* * *

"Hi Lust!" Al chirped as the brothers approached the only female homunculus.

"Hello boys." She greeted warmly. "Didn't you two spend yesterday with Wrath? How did it go?"

Lust had grown attached to the boys surprisingly quickly.

"It went okay." Ed shrugged. "He made us do paperwork, which was really boring."

Lust frowned. "Did he now?"

Al giggled. "We may have messed around with a few things, though."

Lust ruffled their hair. "Well done!"

The two beamed.

Lust smiled. "How would you two like to help me with the cooking?"

Yes, Lust was forced to do all of the cooking. Mostly because literally no one else could (Gluttony would eat everything, Pride couldn't reach everything, Sloth would sleep, Father wouldn't have a clue, and the less said about Envy, Wrath and Greed, the better.)

Meanwhile, Ed and Al almost felt like crying. They had sometimes helped their mother with the cooking before... before she passed away.

Still, attempting to make cookies with Lust was a lot of fun!

Even if they both sucked at cooking. The several flour fights may or may not have resulted in them needing to clean up the entire kitchen area, while the smell of baking cookies attracted Gluttony.

...

The three stared down at the badly burnt items of food that vaugely resembled cookies.

"We tried..." Al sighed.

"It was good, for your first attempt!" Lust encouraged. Envy's first attempt had started a massive fire that had actually burned down half of Central HQ... Of course that was many, many years ago.

The quarantine two years later had been Greed's attempt to be better than Envy.

"I don't think anyone will actually want to eat these." Al said sadly. Ed nodded in agreement glumly.

"Is the food done?" Gluttony asked eagerly, reaching towards the tray.

"You might not wanna eat..." Ed started warningly, and then watched in shock as Gluttony tipped the tray upside down and ate every single last one of the burnt cookies.

The tubby homunculus beamed. "They were really good!"

Two faces stared at him in shock. Lust merely tried to hide a smile.

"Can you cook more often?"

* * *

Father was watching as the two sketched out advanced transmutation circles on the floor with chalk, when the dreaded question was asked.

Normally, these sessions would pass in silence, with the occasional 'if I changed this, wouldn't it work better?' and 'careful with that symbol there, if you get it wrong, it'll blow up'.

But this one time, Edward couldn't keep his mouth shut.

"Hey, I noticed that everyone has these weird tattoos..." The child started, and Father started sweating.

He'd known that it would come to this eventually. They were geniuses. They'd notice that something was off eventually. They'd notice that their relatives weren't exactly human. He just hadn't expected to have to talk about it this quickly.

And boy would this be an awkward conversation. He was fairly sure the whole 'we're homunculi powered by souls... We're immortal and can't die and all that stuff... Oh yeah, we're also the bad guys here... We cool?' wouldn't go down well.

And the book _specifically_ said not to traumatise the children. That was bad for them.

"Yes?" Father said catiously. How could he explain things delicately that wouldn't end up with screaming children.

Lie? No, they were geniuses, they'd see through it eventually.

Tell the truth? Well, he hoped that it wouldn't come to that. Now how to phrase it in a way that wouldn't sound too bad...

Blame everything on Hohenheim? Now there was a good idea. If he could just-

"So should we get the tattoo too?"

Nevermind.

"When you're older, okay?"

"Okay!"

Hohenheim was going to _kill_ him

#

 **(*) Okay, so I made a rather obvious reference... (The whole 'King Explosion Murder was originally formatted to look like it was crossed out, but for some reason, it didn't accept that, so I changed it.) For anyone who is curious or hasn't seen the show, it was from Boku No Hero Academia... Because I can just see similarities everywhere now XD**


End file.
